Zhao Xing, East China Normal University: Games are not the best choice for the development of the meta-universe

Author: Hao Junhui Source: IT Times

After walking through 2021, known as the "first year of the metaverse", at the beginning of the new year, the metacosm continues to maintain high heat. Stripped of the cloak of hype, is the future of a metacosmection optimistic or pessimistic? When will it hit? Can humanity really achieve "immortality" in the metaverse? How do experts, academics and the business community view this future?

On January 12, at an academic symposium on metaversity held at the Shanghai Library, Zhao Xing, a professor in the Department of Information Management at East China Normal University, believed that the real flashpoint of the metacosmection should be two to three years later, "there must be a consumer-level explosive product, just as the iPhone was for the mobile Internet." In the long run, many of the scenarios imagined in the metaverse may gradually land in the next decade. Optimistically, the metacosm era will give birth to one or more companies with a market capitalization of $10 trillion, and we hope, it will be born in China. ”

Professor Zhao Xing, Department of Information Management, East China Normal University

Lesson 1 in the Metaverse: Learn to live in a virtual world

Although 2021 is called the "Metacosm Year One", in fact, it is not a new concept.

The term "metaverse" was born in the 1992 novel Avalanche written by American science fiction writer Neil Stevenson, which describes a virtual world in the future world where people live together, metaverse . 30 years on, many of the novels are becoming a reality, such as the takeaway pizza has become the most important giant company, fiber optic broadband is the infrastructure of high-speed Internet access, and even the houses in Metavalse are priced according to the location.

Zhao Xing pointed out that a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation is being deepened on a global scale, a new generation of network information technology is constantly iteratively upgraded, and the pace of information infrastructure construction and deployment is also accelerating, which provides solid conditions for the development of the metacosmity, "but we did not call it the metacosm before." In the future, the meta-universe will take the lead in the development of entertainment fields such as games, social networking, cultural creation, and content, and will further penetrate into more fields in the future.

In fact, the metaverse depicts the ultimate form of a future in which the virtual world and the real world merge, and a future that is bound to come, and it will be one of the greatest social changes in the next three decades. This historical process, which has been in place since the information age, will reshape almost all tracks. For the field of information management, it is an opportunity and the ultimate challenge.

In the paper "The Governance of the Metaverse: A Preview of agile Governance in the Future Digital Intelligence World", Zhao Xing said that among the potential risks of many metaverses, there are three aspects that should be doubled attention: First, the hidden worry of derealization to virtuality, decentralized organization becoming a social gene, intelligent technology to bring about the virtual industry and other views, although there is a certain basis for insight, but its potential conflict with business formats and social identity needs more attention; second, the risk of game first, The development of the meta-universe space pursued by authenticity and immersion as the core technology will make the "information cocoon" move from theoretical concept to real reality, and its social negative impact in the short term cannot be underestimated; third, the problem of unprepared governance, in recent years, many vertical fields are first barbaric development and then strong governance, resulting in low efficiency of the governance process, heavy sunk costs of the industry after governance, resulting in waste of social resources and unstable factors can not be underestimated, and the "first established and then broken" in the field of rapid development has reached an urgent moment.

"As the main point of the governance of the meta-universe, there must be both moral and legal regulations, as well as the supervision and control of the use of technology, and more importantly, the comprehensive design of education." For example, Zhao Xing said that no educational institution can teach students how to "be a good person" in the virtual space, which may be the first lesson in the metaverse for the new generation of people who will coexist with the digital space in the future.

Imagined future and visible present

As one of the hottest emerging tracks in the current industry, the metacosm depicts the ultimate form of the human world, the rapid integration of the virtual world and the real world on the basis of data intelligence. In fact, such a future is coming.

The upcoming Opening of the East Library of Shanghai Library will be a digital library that is opening the door to the "meta-universe". According to Liu Wei, deputy director of the Shanghai Library, the newly built East Library will have many activities in the virtual world, such as readers can browse the library at home, place orders, borrow books online, and at the same time, many IP will be realized through digital means, such as making a "time machine", through technology, combined with historical materials, restore a historical slice, in the library in the meta-universe, open a book, you can travel to that time, as if back to historical memory.

A number mapping like this may soon become a reality. Liu Wei believes that "new productive forces are roaring and unstoppable, and we must actively embrace the arrival of new technologies." According to Bloomberg Intelligence's previous analysis, it is expected that by 2024, the global meta-universe market size will reach $800 billion, which means that the compound annual growth rate will reach 13.1%.

From the policy side, the current degree of attention to the metaverse is "visible". On December 21, 2021, the Shanghai Municipal Party Committee Economic Work Conference pointed out that it is necessary to guide enterprises to step up research on the important platform for the interaction between the virtual world and the real society in the future, and to cut into the layout in a timely manner. Since then, at the end of December, the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Information Technology has proposed in the "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of Shanghai Electronic Information Industry" that it is necessary to strengthen the forward-looking research and development of the basic core technology capabilities of the underlying core technology of the meta-universe, promote the development of new terminals that deepen perception interaction and the construction of systematic virtual content, and explore industry applications. It is reported that this is also the first time that the metacosm has been written into the local "14th Five-Year Plan" industrial planning.

But at the same time, the Internet monopoly and Internet financial controversy that have erupted intensively since the mobile Internet era have cast a haze on the development of the metaverse. In January 2022, the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other departments jointly issued the Provisions on the Recommendation and Management of Internet Information Service Algorithms, which refers to bad algorithm behavior, marking that the management department has been working hard to seek a positive governance model.

"Games may be the most promising area to be the first to achieve the full application of the metaverse, but it is not the best choice for the development of the metaverse." Zhao Xing believes that from the perspective of social fairness and common prosperity, the development of the meta-universe industry should give priority to promoting the recovery of the real economy, enhancing employment, universal development and paying attention to vulnerable groups, such as digital twins and real-time cloud rendering in the industrial meta-universe, business reconstruction and virtual reality (VR) in industries affected by the epidemic, mixed reality (MR) in business and knowledge exchange scenarios, and augmented reality (AR) for people with disabilities, so as to drive the growth of the real economy. Carefully choose entry points that have no positive social value.

Zhao Xing was the first in academia to propose the agile governance theory of the metacosm. He believes that there are three major points in the agile governance of the metacosm, including the standardization of evaluation and regulatory accountability, the intelligent governance of government affairs, and the intensification of innovation in government, industry and academia. He suggested that in the development of the metaverse and related industries, governance exploration and experimentation should be carried out in a forward-looking manner, "first of all, we need to carry out research on the legislative system of the future digital intelligence world as soon as possible, and improve the legislative system under the new situation." ”